Blue bin bags on way and food waste recycling to follow

RESIDENTS of Wargrave, Charvil and Crazies Hill will receive their allocation of household waste bags in the next few weeks.

This week, Wokingham Borough Council began delivering the blue bags for waste that cannot be recycled and should have covered all homes in the borough by the end of next month.

Each household will receive 80 bags in two rolls of 40, which are to cover the period from April to March next year. This year’s bags have ties rather than handles due to a manufacturing issue.

Residents will also be able to recycle more waste after changes to the rules. Households can cuurently put plastic pots, tubs, trays, clean foil, foil trays and food or drink cartons in their recycling waste.

This means that previously banned items such as fruit and vegetable punnets, non-black ready meal trays, yoghurt pots and margarine tubs can now be recycled. Residents are asked to clean any items left for collection.

Other plastic items such as carrier bags and bin liners, bubble wrap, polystyrene and plant pots still cannot be recycled.

Councillor Norman Jorgensen, the council’s executive member for environment, said: “Our residents are doing a great job in recycling but we know we can do better. On average, half of the items we throw away can be recycled so we encourage everyone to think before throwing something away that could be recycled instead.

“Even one more item a day can save us money that might otherwise help to fund essential services.”

Meanwhile, residents will be able to recycle food waste from April 1 next year.

The council is to introduce weekly food waste collections and each household will be given a 23-litre food bin as well as a smaller version which can be kept indoors. Councillor Simon Weeks, executive member for planning and enforcement, said that as much as 30 per of rubbish that was currently going to landfill was food waste that could be recycled.

He added: “Introducing a doorstep collection is not only great for the environment but is also far more cost effective than sending it to landfill. The cost of recycling waste is around £60 per ton compared with £170 per ton to send it to landfill.”

The food waste will be collected by the council’s contractor, Veolia, whose contract has been extended by seven years from March 2019.